Ofcom, the UK's telecommunications regulator, has told the company raising London's latest erection, the Shard, that two of the country's tallest TV transmission masts stand more proudly skyward than the so-called "vertical city" does.
The 'Shard-on', designed by famed Italian architect Renzo Piano and currently under …

These days...

..."Europe" is often used as shorthand for "The European Union", as opposed to the European continent. I know Moscow can get cold, but I think Lucifer himself would be donning the thermal underwear before Russia joins the EU.

Size

So Ofcom

Those who obsess about such things

like to distinguish between freestanding 'buildings' and 'structures', with the latter consisting of mostly habitable space - offices/flats/hotel rooms*. So the Shard will be the tallest building in Western Europe, with Emley Moor the tallest structure, and honour is satisfied all round.

* The Burj Khalifa now holds both world titles, the first time a building has been the tallest structure since the construction of the CN Tower in 1976.

And why care about the peak?

I'd be more interested in the "highest useful space": the Shard may top at 310m, but the highest occupied floor doesn't seem to be much above 250m. All the rest above is decoration (putting a gsm or tv mast above is just cheating).

A new unit needed

Perhaps we could measure the usable floor space divided by the land area used. Works fairly well until the development of mushroom shaped buildings. As this will measure how much a building has up top I vote this unit is named the "Paris".